"THE END OF EVANGELION" is the final of the series "Neon Genesis Evangelion". This movie is composed of the 25th episode "Air" and 26th episode "True Heart to you" (Magokoro wo, kimi ni).
At the end of TV EP.24 "The last Shito/Nagisa", Kaworu Nagisa, the first one who understands our hero Shinji Ikari, also the last Angel, was killed Shinji's own hand. Ep.25 "Air" starts right after this. Therefore, Ep.25 and Ep.26 are the continuation of TV EP.24 "The last Shito".
In TV, after the EP.24, EP.25 "The end of the world" (Owaru Sekai) and EP.26 "The one who calls only I/Love at the center of the world" (Sekai no Chuushin de AI wo yondake mono) were shown, and the series ended afterwards. Therefore, after the end of TV EP.24, the story of Evangelion can be said to branch into two. There is one ending as shown in TV EP.25 & 26, while the Ep.25 & 26 as shown in "THE END OF EVANGELION" is another ending. (Here we use the kanji number for TV Episode, and Arabic number for the movie episodes) -- PY: I use EP for TV and Ep for movie -- TV "Neon Genesis Evangelion" was an anime series which ran from 1995 October to 1996 March. The planning and original story were done by GAINAX, which is known to produce anime "The Wings of Oneamis" and "Fushigi no Umi no Nadia", also games like "Princess Mecha".
The animation production was done by GAINAX and Tatsunokopuro. "Neon Genesis Evangelion" has always been, since its inception to this movie, evolving with the director Hideaki Anno as the centre.
From the theme, the skeleton of the story, up till the single pieces of the dialogue, they all bear the stint of Anno's creative individuality.
When Evangelion was shown on TV, it received the enthusiatic support of many fans. Discussions started on many topics: The intriguing SF settings, the dyanmic fighting scenes, the metaphysical taste derived from the appearance of many Christian and psychoanalytical jargons, the super-intensive amount of information. Evangelion overtakes all prevous anime on all these counts. It could be taken as real "Neon Genesis" of anime. The tremendous popularity could match the biggest hits like "Space Battleship Yamato" and "Mobile Suit Gundam". The "Eva phenonmenon" was created.
The big theme in Evangelion is the "heart of people". This is also one of the attractions of this series which counld not be found in other anime works. The relationship with others, the meaning of the existence of self, what is the self.... Evangelion started as a realistic SF mecha action anime. At first, the "people's heart" issue of the main characters is just some add-on to the drama. However, as the plot moved forward, the issue of "people's heart" grew much bigger than other elements like mecha actions or the solutions to the mysteries.
At the last episode of the TV series, "Sekai no Chuushin de AI wo yondake mono", it became an odd-looking episode which depicted only the internal world of the hero Shinji Ikari. Although that was fulfilling for the main theme, the drama of the characters and further development of the Eva world were left unfinished as the story ended.
It became an exploding issue as the last TV episode was considered incomplete. The voice of the fans grew stronger and stronger as they demanded the proper ending of the drama, the explanation of the mysteries or just a new story. With a view to meeting these demands, it was decided to remake the EP.25 & 26.
At first, the remade episodes 25 and 26 were supposed to be released in OVA, but during production it was decided that it would be a theatre release. There is a "EVANGELION DEATH AND REBIRTH" (Shito Shinsei) which consists of the summary episode of the TV series "Death" and the new remade "Air" which serves as a climax.
However, since later the content of the remake grew to an unexpected proportion, the content shown in "REBIRTH" was actually 2/3 of the new episode 25. As the first part of the final, "EVANGELION DEATH and REBIRTH" was shown in March 1997.
It has been 4 months after "EVANGELION DEATH AND REBIRTH", and now the completion of the final is shown. This is this movie "THE END OF EVANGELION"
As mentioned before, "THE END OF EVANGELION" is the continuaton from TV EP.24 "The last Angel". All the Angels had died. Now the final phase, the Human Complementation Project of Seele, had started.
The Strategic Self-Defense Force attacked the Headquarter of NERV. The deathly fight between Asuka's EVA-02 and the mass production models of EVA series. The resolved mysteries. And then, the ending of the HCP. The heart of Shinji.... In Ep.25 (AIR) and Ep.26 (True Heart to You), drama of main characters, actions, solutions to the mysteries etc are all contained. Also this is done in an experimental way, which strives to the follow the TV series in bringing up the real issue of "people's heart". As its title suggests, this is the ending of the final of "Neon Genesis Evangelion"
The chief director and script play is Hideaki Anno. The castings of Ep.25 (Air) is Waya Tsurumaki (PY: don't know whether this is the correct translation) and that of Ep.26 (True Heart to You) is Hideaki Anno. The animation production is, as in EVANGELION DEATH AND REBIRTH, jointly done by GAINAX and PRODUCTION I.G.
The movie lasts for about 87 minutes.